LANGUAGE IN INDIA

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Volume 26:2 February 2026
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Dependency Relation between Number and Gender in Chang

Laishram Bijenkumar Singh, MA, Ph.D. &
Waikhom Pinky Devi, MA, Ph.D.

Abstract

The present paper highlights the dependency relations of gender and number in Chang, a Naga language belonging to the Tibeto-Burman language family spoken in the North East state of Nagaland, India. The study is based on Greenberg’s universal 36, which states that if a language has the category of gender, then it always has the category number (Greenberg 1963). Chang validates Greenberg’s universal 36 and explores the presence of gender and number in the language, where nouns in Chang differentiate the marking of masculine and feminine gender in both animate human and animate non-human nouns. The language distinguishes plurality in the form of suffixation. The order of gender and number in the language is fixed, which shows the interdependence of Gender and number in the language.

Keywords:dependency, gender, number, Chang

About Chang

Chang is a language spoken in the North East state of Nagaland, India. Chang is a major tribe that has its own distinct culture and language. Chang is dominant in the Tuensang district, which is 274 km from the capital city, Kohima. The term Chang indicates both the language and the community that speaks it. Chang is also known by alternate names Mojung, Changyanguh, Mochumi and Mochunger. According to the 2001 census, the total population of Chang is 60,9000 inhabited in 36 villages. Chang doesn’t have its own script; it uses Roman script for writing purposes. Benedict (1972), has classified Chang with the Konyak group.

Introduction

The paper explores the formation of gender and number and their interdependence based on Greenberg's Universal 36, which states that if a language has the category of gender, then it always has the category number (Greenberg 1963). According to Corbett, gender and number are two features of nominal morphosyntax which contributes to reference construal and reference tracking, that is, to the linguistic representation of real-world entities. Gender is a nominal classi?cation strategy which, in the languages that possess it, functions as an inherent lexical property of nouns. Corbett further stated that Gender distinctions distribute the nominal lexicon of a language into two or several classes whose semantic motivation varies a great deal in the languages of the world, while generally revolving around such notions as animacy, sex, size and shape. Number is a feature of inherent nominal in?ection. Number distinctions serve the purpose of representing nouns and noun phrases as denoting one or several instances of an entity (Corbett 2000). Plurality is the most frequently attested type of number value, and the one that is also most likely to be obligatorily coded across the languages of the world (Corbett 2000; Greenberg 1963). The present paper focuses on two sections, namely the marking of gender and number in Chang and testing the validity of Greenberg’s universal 36 to see whether gender hinges on number in the language or not.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Laishram Bijenkumar Singh, MA, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Centre for Naga Tribal Language Studies (CNTLS)
Nagaland University, Kohima Campus, Meriem-797004
Nagaland
bijen.laishram@nagalanduniversity.ac.in
&
Waikhom Pinky Devi, MA, Ph.D.
Guest Faculty
Dept. of Linguistics
Nagaland University, Kohima Campus, Meriem-797004
Nagaland
waikhompinky91@gmail.com

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